Senators want answers on veterans records breach

Feb. 4, 2014 - 12:34PM
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ST. LOUIS — Both U.S. senators from Missouri are seeking answers about the potential fallout for veterans and their families after a former clerk admitted misfiling hundreds of military records at a St. Louis warehouse.

Lonnie Halkmon was placed on two years of probation last week after earlier pleading guilty to destroying government records. A 2012 audit of the National Personnel Records Center in St. Louis found that he had wrongly filled nearly three-fourths of 1,200 files over a three-month period.

Workers there earn bonuses for completing more filings, and supervisors say some workers deliberately stash records to finish more quickly.

Republican Sen. Roy Blunt and Democrat Claire McCaskill sent a letter Tuesday asking what steps the National Personnel Records Center is taking to prevent something like that from happening again.